A study slated to be released next month will help local officials decide how to make West Cervantes Street safer for drivers and pedestrians.

Last week, the Pensacola City Council unanimously voted to approve $1.5 million to fund short-term safety improvements on the West Cervantes Street corridor.

Pensacola City Councilwoman Jewel Cannada-Wynn — who represents the city's portion of the corridor and brought forward the motion for the funding — said the next step is awaiting the results of a Florida Department of Transportation feasibility study that will help frame the most effective ways to use the funding.

"(The study will) include an anatomy of accidents, data on citizens crossing back and forth and east and west, helping us understand where accidents are occurring and why this is happening on this street," Cannada-Wynn said.

At least four more pedestrians have died since January of 2017: Faith Shoemore, 39, was killed March 10, 2017, while crossing near H Street; Nancy Jean Jenkins, 55, was killed while crossing near F Street on Jan. 5, 2018; and Nephateria Monique Williams, 28, and her friend's 8-month-old daughter, Neariaah Williams, were killed in a hit-and-run June 6, 2018.

All four fatalities occurred in the portion of Cervantes between E Street and Pace Boulevard, an area that stretches for more than half a mile of West Cervantes with no north-to-south crosswalks.

A spacing problem

In that same immediate vicinity are the Englewood Senior Apartments, the Attucks Court and Morris Court apartments, the Fricker Resource Center, a long-stay hotel, a dozen or so retail shops, several bus stops and many people moving back and forth between them nearly all day, everyday.

Cannada-Wynn said many of the people in the area walk by necessity, and that the spacing of the crosswalks "doesn't take into account their behaviors."

On Wednesday morning, the councilwoman stood by a roadside memorial to Nephateria Williams and Neariaah Williams and pointed out some of the issues she was personally aware of.

She noted that families headed to the Fricker Center were likely to just cross Cervantes at F Street rather that walk the extra block to the crosswalk at E Street. She also pointed out bus stops where people were likely to sprint across the road rather than risk missing their ride.

Cannada-Wynn said crosswalks were equally sparse in Brownsville on the west side of Pace Boulevard, counting out the crossings at T Street, W Street, and Shoemaker and Green streets by memory.

While she spoke, people periodically darted across four lanes of traffic between gaps in the 50-mph traffic.

At bus stops, beauty parlors and convenience stops up and down the West Cervantes corridor, people can name people they knew or knew of who had been killed while crossing the street.

"Everybody that gets hit, there is no injured; it's just dead," said Calvin Moore, a 13-year resident of the area.

Waiting at a bus stop with a walker, he said although he knew how to navigate the streets safely, he didn't cross at night. He said he was happy to hear improvements were coming, but he didn't understand why it had taken so long.

"They know it's a dangerous stretch of highway," he said. "It took a child to get hit for them to do something."

No Band-Aids

Cannada-Wynn said her hopes are that the short-term safety improvement funding can be used for things like low-level lighting to make pedestrians more visible to drivers, pedestrian safety islands between east- and west-bound traffic lanes, and, of course, more crosswalks.

She said the FDOT study would help officials understand how and where those measures could be installed to do the most good.

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A vehicle surpasses the speed limit on Cervantes Street in Pensacola on Thursday, June 21, 2018.(Photo: Gregg Pachkowski/gregg@pnj.com)

Last week, a group of concerned citizens went before the Florida-Alabama Transportation Planning Organization and garnered support for some quick, simple fixes that could be implemented immediately such as an increased police presence to monitor for speeding, narrowing lanes and more crosswalks.

Cannada-Wynn said she was pleased with the level of citizen engagement and supportive of suggestions, but she said she wanted to ensure that any actions the city took were permanent solutions rather than well-meaning ideas that were here today, gone tomorrow.

"My main concern is, I don't want Band-Aids," Cannada-Wynn said.

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A pedestrian crosses Cervantes Street between E and F Streets in Pensacola on Thursday, June 21, 2018.(Photo: Gregg Pachkowski/gregg@pnj.com)

Escambia County Commissioner Lumon May said addressing road safety on West Cervantes has been a priority for the past four to five years, but local officials hadn't been able to get the project onto state-level priority lists.

The road is owned by the state, meaning there is a certain level of process and time involved in getting even the most basic things done, according to Cannada-Wynn.

The FDOT fast-tracked a project to install new LED lighting over a 2-mile stretch of Cervantes between A and Dominguez streets after the fatal June 6 hit-and-run. The project is slated to be finished by August, and even Gov. Rick Scott touched on the importance of getting it done during a recent visit to Pensacola.

"I've got grandkids, and every time something like this happens you think of your family," Scott said.

Both Cannada-Wynn and May expressed their gratitude to local officials, state representatives and senators, and state employees for helping the project come together so quickly.